From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
Skinning and hosting by the epically talented Kaons, and functionality fanciness by the coding magic of Neowulf. If you ever see either of them around, make sure to show them some love!
”Nah. It’s a ship,” Jack says. An excuse to get off the beach, to continue finding more out about Ascended (this one doesn’t seem to want to kill him) and to get back to familiar and comfortable spaces without making it seem like he needs it, even if he does. Not usually one to accept help, nonetheless the smuggler is in no fit state to do it himself, so he grunts a thanks as he finds his feet beneath him again, scoffing at Edwyn’s being strong.
”I believe it, though it don’t sound right comin’ from you,” he grumbles, starting off down the beach and rolling his shoulder, fingers pressing into the tender muscles there. ”Ah yes, quite. An evenin’, then. The fuck made you want to Ascend, anyway?”
Ahh, do be careful writer. Jack doesn't invite just anyone aboard the Ark. But of course you wouldn't know that, would you? As you were.
"A ship I believe I can survive." Edwyn chuckles, seemingly at the ready to offer Jack whatever physical support he might need for the trek toward the harbour. If no aid is needed the ascended will simply tuck his hands away in his pockets, strolling easily at the side of one of the most dangerous men in Torchline.
"Ah, lots of reasons." Inclining his head toward Jack's sopping wet clothes as if to indicate they serve as their own sort of answer, Edwyn continues. "I can't drown." He doesn't include all the other things that might otherwise have accompanied his answer. Things like, I might have been able to save her, as my muscles wouldn't have tired. The sea could have bashed me around all it liked without doing much damage. But he doesn't. Much as Edwyn would like to answer the captain's question fully, he isn't so cruel as that. "What I don't understand is why anyone wouldn't want to ascend, when you get down to it. No more illness...the current situation notwithstanding. Pain never impacts your thinking, and without pain, your fear of things diminishes too. Or at least I've found it has."
Rolling his shoulders easily as sand gives way to the familiar pathways towards the port, Edwyn flashes Jack a smile. "And when it comes to biting and such? Well...just think of it a bit like the need for sex and food rolled into one. It really isn't so different from how I was before. Just...certain things have become narrowed. I quite like it."
Edwyn will find that no help is needed, and Jack similarly shoves his hands in the pockets of his wet pants, finding almost everything he was carrying to be ruined; cigarettes, matchbook, some soggy note or other. With a mental groan, his blue eyes flick back across to the Ascended at his side. He listens to it all, to the things both said and unsaid, and were he not so schooled in his telepathy as to keep a poker face, he might have smiled. Instead, he simply gazes across the beach to the port in the near distance.
”It sounds borin’,” he says simply. ”No pain? Fuck that - pain’s a fine motivator. Pleasure, too. An’ you’ll forgive me for actually wantin’ to fuck with my dick, not my teeth.” Everyone’s got their own kinks, he supposes. It isn’t like Jack can say much; for a second his mind wanders to a bed afloat in the ocean, a storm heaving around them. He shakes that away, however.
Stepping onto the boardwalk, he makes his way down towards the shipyard. ”An’ if you didn’t wanna drown, you could’ve just got yourself a jewel from a cloud manta.”
"True, they are." Edwyn responds reasonably enough. "But they aren't the only ones. And they aren't always good ones, at that." Many noble things had been done in the name of seeking pleasure and avoiding pain, but lots of terrible things as well. If anything, the writer thinks he's a lot more logical now without such things weighing him down. "Ahh well. It isn't such a big price to pay in the end. Besides, there are ways around that." Edwyn adds with a cunning smile, meaning to leave the sex-room back in the Hollowed Grounds a mystery, but thinking about it loudly enough he might as well be shouting in Jack's ear.
"Good advice, from a man who just nearly drowned." The ascended points out with an easy smile, not meaning to offend, only pointing out the ironic timing of Jack's advice.
"It must be awful nice to have so much time to philosophise on that sort of shit. Is that what's left, when pleasure an' pain ain't around any more?" Jack smirks across to Edwyn, unashamedly enjoying the ribbing from a man whose mind gives him away as being soft and dreamy. Especially since he gets as good as he gives, it appears, and between the distraction of an Ascended sex room and the realisation that he's been caught with his pants down (and without a cloud manta jewel), Jack can only scoff and reach out to clap him roughly on the shoulder.
Touche," says, his feet echoing in a hollow drumbeat on the docks. "I'll make a point to carry a jewel with me from now on, so I'm not such a burden, washing up on shore in front of you." Speaking of in front of, Jack halts suddenly to nod up to the ship beside them. "Welcome to the Ark. She good enough for your notepad?"
